To add a colum down the side you would need to add another column to the table Borg created above.
Code in the Header:
<table width="100%">
<tr>
<td width="150">
Navigation Menu
Place html for navigation here!
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>
The width="150" part specifies how many pixels wide you want the navigation to be. The width="100%" part specifies that you want the table to use all the screen's real estate.
Code in footer:
</td>
</tr>
</table>
The above code would provide the basic shell for a navigation bar on the left hand side of the screen, with the forum appearing to the right of the navigation.
If you wanted a right hand column, add the code in red to the footer similar to how it is added to the header.
There are other attributes you can add. If you need more information, you can do research on web about creating html tables.